Spifftacular is a blog about a mum and a wife who like nerd stuff and also to do handicrafts. Well, it seems like she is a big fan of “Fantastic Mr. Fox”, and she wanted to do a thematic birthday for her baby.

Movieline sat down with Wes and asked him about his favorite movie scene. His pick might rile up some more unpleasant comments, but please let’s focus on the movies people, always the movies.

The Scene: Great Missenden, about an hour outside of London — the Platonic ideal of the English countryside village, lined with perfectly tended row houses and gardens. It’s home to Roald Dahl’s estate and the Roald Dahl Museum, which today is overrun by international press who’ve gathered to interview the cast and crew of Fantastic Mr. Fox— Wes Anderson’s stop-motion adaptation of the Dahl classic. At The Nags Head Pub, Bill Murray pours pints for starstruck onlookers from behind the bar, as a small group of journalists sit around a table grilling Anderson on his animated opus. It seemed as good a moment as any to play My Favorite Scene with the director — though I must admit we never saw his answer coming.

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After a decade brewing in the mind of one of Hollywood’s most idiosyncratic directors, the long-awaited adaptation of Roald Dahl’s Fantastic Mr Fox — with 30 sets based on the author’s own home and village — will open The Times BFI London Film Festival in the autumn.

The stop-motion animation of Dahl’s children’s book stars George Clooney, who voices the ingenious Mr Fox, and Meryl Streep as Mrs Fox. Michael Gambon supplies the voice of the malevolent farmers, and the pop singer Jarvis Cocker plays a musically inclined farmhand. It will premiere at the 53rd film festival on October 14.

His recent films have been offbeat, melancholy comedies, but what Wes Anderson really wanted to do was bring his favourite Roald Dahl story from childhood to the big screen. After nearly a decade of planning, during which he made The Royal Tenenbaums, The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou and The Darjeeling Limited, the American director has started work in London on an animated version of Fantastic Mr Fox, with George Clooney providing the voice of the eponymous hero.

Dahl’s classic tale was written in 1970 after he had made his name as a children’s writer with Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and James and the Giant Peach. Aimed at younger readers, it pits the daring Mr Fox against three memorably grotesque farmers who are determined to put an end to his raids on their stock by shooting him or starving his family out of their den. “It was one of my favourite books as a child,” Anderson told The Times. “I have been trying to make this film for eight years.”

New characters and plotlines, including something resembling a raid scene, have been introduced to make the story into a feature-length film.

“There’s a whole new bit at the start and a new section at the end, but we’ve tried to do something that Roald Dahl would love,” Anderson, who is writing the script with Noah Baumbach, a director, said.

Amanda Conquy, who runs Roald Dahl’s literary estate, said that she and Felicity, the author’s widow, had no doubts that the pair had the right vision for the project.
“Whatever Wes does is interesting and has a definite point of view. He understands the humour of Dahl and the sweetness and slightly anarchic nature of this story,” Ms Conquy added.